Recently in Patent Category

I got back from Interop New York 2009 last night and was pretty excited to conduct a number of video interviews in the new TMC Newsroom set. One of the videos I was particularly excited to conduct was with Dr. Gaston Ormazabal, Distinguished Member of the Technical Staff, Verizon Labs. Gaston and the team he works with have found some SIP security flaws and are working hard to solve the problems. These discoveries leave SIP servers open to attacks which come in a number of forms such as malformed packets, out of state machine order packets and packet floods. Gaston is working on these projects with Henning Schulzrinne, the inventor of SIP at Columbia University and he is also working with researchers at NYU.

Some of the other key people working on this project are Verizon's Stu Elby, VP of Network Architecture at VZ Labs (Corporate Technology) and Flavio Bonomi, Head of Cisco Research. Cisco by the way is funding this project and is using the results of this research to develop hardware which stops attacks on SIP servers.

The video interview is below and here is a link which takes you to a page with all of the videos from Interop New York 2009. They are being added all the time so check back often.

For the record, Google Guide is not a product or service developed by Google. To learn what I believe this service can become, please keep reading.

I spent some time with the new Motorola Droid this weekend and I interviewed customers and employees of the store and came away fairly impressed with what I heard and saw. Certainly my outing at the Verizon store was better than my recent experience checking out the Blackberry Storm 2. The Droid is about the same size and weight of an iPhone but has a full keyboard which slides out from the side of the device. Typing on it was a satisfying experience and although some have complained it is thin and does not provide adequate tactile response, I believe the compromise between size and feedback to be good.

In terms of device speed, the iPhone 3G S and the Droid render web pages about exactly as fast as one another. I tested both using the native 3G networks each device utilizes by browsing numerous Global Online Communities on TMCnet and other websites which are graphically rich. Although the Droid boasts double the number of pixels as the iPhone, in typical web browsing it is difficult if not impossible to see the difference. Perhaps a photo editing program or advanced game would be better able to take advantage of these pixels.

The benefits of Motorola's Droid over the iPhone are that it allows for multitasking, has free turn-by-turn navigation, a full keyboard, has tight integration with Google services and works on the Verizon Wireless network. The downside to the device is it still not as slick or as charming as the iPhone and doesn't sync with iTunes. Its software is more Microsoft-like than Apple. I did however notice that each Android update seems to imitate the iPhone more closely and aside from software patent issues, it seems Google knows it needs to basically duplicate the iPhone experience to make the phone as desirable as Apple's device.

The challenge for Google is the ecosystem issue and whether it can get developers (currently Android has one tenth the number of applications - meaning 10,000 to Apple's 100,000) to take its products seriously enough to program for them. Verizon Wireless staff members told me sales for this device were strong and prospective customers I spoke with seemed very happy. Ironically, I walked to the nearby Apple store and saw less people there than at any time in the past few years. I asked a salesperson if this was normal and he said no, it is light. Certainly my mall visit does not make a trend but nonetheless it is ironic to see light traffic at the Apple store on the day Droids are selling briskly.

Another Android phone came out this past Friday as well, the HTC Droid Eris and it is a pure touchscreen device (no keyboard) with hardware which is inferior to the Motorola device. Sales of this phone were slower than that of its more powerful sibling I was told.

A number of people in the telecom industry who played with the Motorola Droid these past few days told me they weren't so impressed with the device and from a UI perspective this is understandable. The challenge for Google now is to rapidly improve this phone to the point where it is enjoyable to use. Yes, you read that right. People like to pick up the iPhone and they expect to like the way phones work. Even though the Droid hardware is not as slick as the iPhone, we can forgive this transgression because at least it gets the Verizon network. Users however won't forgive a substandard UI and poor hardware. If this thing is supposed to kill the iPhone, it needs to get users to say "wow" when they pick it up. Until I start hearing "wows" I am not declaring it an iPhone killer by any means.

But let's not leave it there as Google has done a masterful job of changing the rules of the game by giving away turn-by-turn GPS and other services such as Gmail. You see, Google is a machine of doling out free services which customers once had to pay for. We can expect Google to compete viciously by providing free service after service which is optimized for mobile devices. Unified communications, Google Wave, Google Voice, etc. The company is uniquely positioned in fact to provide you with a service which uses your browsing habits to determine your local interests. Meaning if you often search for the phone number of a local sushi restaurant, Google can use that information to let you know when you are near other sushi restaurants in unfamiliar areas. Let's call this forthcoming service which for now is imaginary, Google Guide.

Is this a service which may make users switch cell phones? Perhaps, but not immediately. In the mean time, Google will devote its significant resources to filling application holes with its own services in the hopes of developing killer apps which can't easily be duplicated on the iPhone or anywhere else.

I wanted to alert my readers to some exciting news happening at TMC. As you likely know TMC is among a handful of media companies growing at a time when the media landscape is in dramatic decline. As you might imagine this growth is primarily online. Over the last decade and especially in the last few years we have focused on building online communities (Channels and GOCs) for customers who sponsor these areas as they rapidly attract focused decision-makers from around the world.

The visitors who come to these communities benefit from a massive amount of free content which helps them make informed purchasing decisions. For example people looking for products in Call Recording, Smart Data Centers, IP communications, HD Voice, Fixed Mobile Convergence or Next Generation Communications can come to the respective communities focused on these topics and have access to hundreds and in most cases thousands of TMC written articles detailing the news in their specific area of interest. Our business model is straightforward; aggregate massive amounts of focused and quality content using custom-built content targeting technology - make it relevant and pertinent so as to attract the right readers who need this information as they research the products and services they are looking to buy.

For our sponsors, these communities allow them to rank high organically on search engines to get their message out to a focused audience while simultaneously being able to measure the traffic to ensure they can justify their spend to the sales and executive management teams.

Basically, this suite of communities replicates the trade show model online and just like a trade show that attracts more attendees as the exhibitor base grows; the 120 monthly sponsored communities on TMCnet attract a massive audience which in turn attracts more sponsors.

In short, I am very confident we can continue to provide free quality content in all the areas we enter. Meaning while other media companies are beginning to charge for their once free content and many others are reducing their editorial teams, TMC is adding to its editorial, sales and marketing teams as we have a model which works exceptionally well for our readers and sponsors.

We are growing our team as we enter a slew of new markets with our business model of providing laser-focused content - backed by over a decade of proprietary content targeting technology; essentially building targeted online communities which rank high on search engines as they attract large amounts of focused traffic.

Here is my quote from a press release we put out today mentioning the hire of a brand new position - VP of Business Development. Matt Weiner is filling this position and his background of working for Penton and Yahoo! make him a good fit for the position."Over the last decade, TMC has invested in the technology and people necessary to build a next-generation media company which creates communities online, in-print and in-person," Tehrani continued. "By providing our audience with top quality news, training and information, we have attracted global purchasing decision-makers to our communities. As TMC's global communities have increased in size and quality, they have attracted hundreds of advertisers and sponsors who receive regular measurable results for their marketing and SEO budgets. Our future strategy involves continuing to build communities which draw large amounts of targeted traffic as we continue to connect buyers and sellers -- and adding Matt to the team is an integral element of that strategy."

Aside from Matt, we have added a number of other positions and just as importantly we continue to ink partnership after new partnership as we enter new spaces where we leverage our community building engine in combination with the thought leadership of individuals and/or corporations in new markets.

Thank you for continuing to support our rapid growth - thanks to our readers and existing and news sponsors - we look forward to helping all of your companies grow with ours.

In the last two weeks I drove (well I was in the car anyway) for more than 1,500 miles meeting with tech companies in Montreal, Ontario, Massachusetts, Rochester, NY, Los Angeles and San Diego. The last stop on my latest trip was at CTIA where I saw dozens of companies from around the globe.

Most of my travels involve learning about companies in the communications and technology space and often advising them on how they can be more successful. Sometimes I get to see some very innovative solutions which I can't share at the time for a multitude of reasons (embargos, etc) and other times I get a firsthand look at things which I share as soon as I can. In many cases, companies ask me about TMC's experience in helping companies with their thought leadership, branding and lead generation activities.

As CEO of a media company which builds online, in-person and print communities for millions of global purchasing decision-makers each month, I have an unusual role of also writing about many of the companies, products and services I see. What is fun for me is finding new ways to bring buyers and sellers together. Buyers want to quickly learn about which products they should consider before purchasing and sellers are looking to sell as much as they can while spending the least amount in doing so.

It is an amazing place to sit because extremely often I see industry-changing technology which languishes because an engineer sets the marketing budget and has the corporate communications skills of sheetrock. Remember, I have an engineering degree so I feel I am uniquely qualified to beat up my brethren. Then there are the companies I visit where their products shouldn't be accepted for free, yet they sell in volume and make massive margins because they are able to communicate the benefits properly.

Then there are a slew of "Hail Mary" companies which have really cool products but no business model to speak of. Sometimes I can convince the founder of such a company to modify their offerings to actually make money but other times the companies die on the vine because they think they know best - after all, I just meet a thousand companies plus like them a year - what do I know?. Sometimes though the amazing happens and they  get purchased by a Google, Cisco or Oracle and thus the "Hail Mary" designation.

I am thrilled to act as a trusted advisor on PR and marketing issues and I figured it is unfair for me to only share information with people I choose to visit and subsequently I spoke on a webinar a month or so ago about hosted SEO which was well-attended and generated lot buzz in the industry. So many companies wonder about search engine optimization and what the trick is to ranking high. While there are lots of factors to consider, the basic premise is to write lots of content which people want to read and share with others.

SEO consultants get paid to help companies rank higher and in some cases they can boost a company's search rank for a while. But in the end, steady and relatively large amounts of content are what companies need to generate to rank high on various terms.

I could go on about building communities and improving SEO for hours - I am truly passionate about figuring out how to instantly bring a group of people with similar interests together on a single web portal. Coming from the world of magazines, it used to take TMC six months to build a mailing list and in many cases you really needed 18 months to do it right. Oh and did I mention you had to mail at least half a million subscription offers and it would cost you about $400,000 at a minimum to rent lists, print and mail your subscription forms? To show you how much things have changed, TMC has been involved in projects in the past few months where we built communities on new topics which are up and running and attracting hundreds of thousands of people in a matter of a few weeks. It is truly amazing to see how media has evolved through the use of news-generated, laser focused community building.

Again, these topics are a major passion of mine and something my team at TMC has gotten great at focusing on. The next webinar I will speak on takes place Thursday of this week, October 15^th at 12:00 PST and on it I will discuss how you can partner to boost your search engine marketing. I look forward to seeing you there. Be sure to register now so you don't miss it. As a reminder, you can view the archive if you aren't around at this exact time. Just be sure to register. Also, be sure to bring any questions you have. I look forward to answering them this week.

Leveraging Ecosystems Eclipses Developing Products

Widgets for TVs, application stores for wireless phones, applets for the connected home and automobiles... The trend is clear as smart ecosystems have emerged on the scene as a new way to generate revenue while locking in customers to specific hardware/software solutions. For many manufacturers such as Avaya, Cisco, RIM, Nokia, Apple and makers of televisions, it is no longer adequate to focus exclusively on the products your company develops. Now you have to figure out how to build a smart ecosystem around your offerings in order to leverage an able and willing (hardware and software) developer community who will evangelize your platform and develop long-tail applications, services and add-ons which boost the value of your ecosystem.

In order to help educate the emerging smart ecosystem community, TMC has partnered with Crossfire Media and distinguished college professor Mary Cronin PhD to launch a smart ecosystem portal containing news, thought leadership and analysis called SPEC which stands for Smart Product Ecosystems Connection and located at www.specosys.com.

As you may recall, Crossfire Media is home to Carl Ford and together we have already partnered to build online and live communities (4GWE and M2M Summit) in the 4G and M2M spaces.

This partnership also includes Mary Cronin, a professor in the Information Systems Department of Boston College's Carroll School of Management. Mary is a true thought leader in the space and you can expect to hear her prescient thoughts on how ecosystems will take root and evolve. Her first article is titled Five Rules for Smart Product Ecosystems.

The coverage areas will extend into a variety of industries and for now they include Telecom & Mobile; Health & Medical; Automotive & Telematics; Home Automation and Connected Home Entertainment Devices; Energy Monitoring and Personal Energy Management Solutions. We are open to adding new areas so drop us a line with suggestions.

It is evident that as time goes on, companies in all industries will be looking to tie their products and services into more and more ecosystems. They will either develop their own and/or leverage others on the market. In order to stay up to date on the investment, partnering and other opportunities ahead, be sure to bookmark the new SPEC smart ecosystem site and check back often.

He is worth billions and he still works as hard as anyone I know. He travels the world and closes business. He actually said selling things turns him on. It shows - the companies he has started are some of the most successful around. I hope to have a fraction of his energy at his age.

Based upon the crowd here at his address and the focus by audience members on every word Terry is saying, it seems we picked a great keynoter for this event. Here is a clip of Terry speaking and the crowd shot of who was there.

His went on to share UC best practices and shared what he believes you should look for when buying new communications systems.

Here is a brief video of the the presentation and the crown in attendance.

NORWALK, CT- August 31, 2009 - Technology Marketing Corporation (TMC) today announced that their editorial and conference teams have completed final preparations for this week's ITEXPO West 2009 at the L.A Convention Center in Los Angeles. The conference and EXPO, being held for the 20^th time since its launch in 1999, features a robust conference program, keynotes by industry leaders and visionaries, and networking opportunities where buyers and sellers can meet and forge relationships.

ITEXPO officially opens Tuesday, September 1 with a full-day of conference sessions, workshops, keynotes, and a networking reception.

The ITEXPO exhibit hall is open during the following hours:

Wednesday, September 2: 4:00pm - 8:00pm
Thursday, September 3: 11:15am - 5:00pm

TMC also reported that all dedicated hotel room blocks at the Westin Bonaventure, the official show hotel, have completely sold out.

"The hotels are sold out, pre-registered exhibit hall attendance is up over 2008, and the exhibit hall is filled with companies displaying some of the most innovative communications technologies. All elements are pointing toward a terrific event," proclaimed TMC CEO Rich Tehrani.

Tehrani added, "And what's most exciting is that the registration figures that are trending ahead of last year suggests that companies are ready once again serious about investing in technologies that can help be more productive. It appears that buyers and sellers are once again poised to gather in L.A. to close deals, form partnerships and develop new relationships - the hallmarks of the ITEXPO experience."

Highlights of ITEXPO West 2009 include:

• Conference tracks covering Enterprise and Service Provider solutions, unified communications, SIP, and Wireless/Mobility solutions
• TMCUniversity Certification Courses: IP Network Security and Microsoft OCS
• Fonality trixbox Open Communication Certification (FtOCC)
• Ingate's Free SIP Trunking Workshop
• Sipera's UC Security Workshop
• Collocated M2M Evolution Conference
• Collocated Smart Grid Summit Conference
• Collocated 4GWE Conference
• Asterisk Training Courses
• Reseller Solutions Day free workshop
• Keynotes by ShoreTel, Aspect, Paetec, Alvarion, Sir Terry Matthews of Wesley Clover, Clearwire, and Interactive Intelligence
• Open Source Pavilion on the exhibit floor, showcasing open source solutions

In addition to the educational and networking opportunities, attendees have the chance to win a brand new Jeep, an iPhone, Slingbox, or HP Netbook.

Visit www.itexpo.com for more information or to register for ITEXPO West 2009.

Contact Information: